Carrotmob Organizes Consumer Purchases to Encourage Social Change

Working opposite to a boycott, Carrotmob organizes groups of ethically-minded shoppers who select a business at which to spend their money as a group, allowing them to "vote with their money." The requirements? The business has to agree to implement the socially-responsible changes requested by the mob.

As the video outlines about, there are five principles to a successful Carrotmob:

1. Businesses compete with how much good they are willing to do.
2. Consumers choose one business they want to reward.
3. Consumers support that business by making coordinated purchases.
4. The most responsible business gets rich.
5. Consumers buy things that they would buy anyway, but by organizing themselves, they change the world!

So far Carrotmob has had almost 200 campaigns in cities like Antwerp, Bangkok and Portland. On the website, vistors can check out current campaigns, read about the ask, and see the number of mobbers committed and the "Carrot," or amount of money the campaigners expect to bring the business, should they agree to the ask. They can also sign up to join in on Carrotmobs in their own city.

Technically Carrotmob is a social business in the making as they have yet to earn revenue, but the plans are there.

"The primary model we are going to pursue will work like this: With our team and our technology we will help facilitate campaigns, and then we will charge businesses a small fee based on how much money the mob collectively spends," Carrotmob says. "This fee will vary based on the circumstances of the campaign, but in general we think it's the most sensible revenue model for us to pursue. Hopefully we will be able to implement several additional revenue models over time, which will allow us to hire a bigger team, make our website better, orchestrate bigger and bigger campaigns, and spread the Carrotmob model to communities around the world."